


both sides

by zhuzhubi



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Angst, Bisexual Spencer Reid, Chess, First Meetings, Idiots in Love, M/M, Meet-Cute, Past Violence, Post-Prison, Sorta I guess, as per usual, but its just spencer being oblivious, past bullying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:42:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28278573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zhuzhubi/pseuds/zhuzhubi
Summary: a post prison spencer fic inspired by chanel by frank ocean(or, bi!spencer and male!reader play chess in the park)
Relationships: Spencer Reid/Reader
Comments: 2
Kudos: 33





	both sides

**Author's Note:**

> on tumblr @zhuzhubii :)
> 
> this was a request and after listening to the song many times, i'm still not 100% sure what chanel is about other than the obvious bisexual part. so this is just vaguely inspired by the ~vibes~ pretty much

It’s cold out, but Spencer’s not wearing a coat. His hands are freezing. His clothes are wet from the snow.

And yet he can’t seem to make himself move, can’t seem to make himself go back home. His apartment is across the street - it’d only take him a few minutes to run inside, but he still can’t muster up the motivation to move. He lifts a hand, red and stiff and icy, to trace over the pattern on the table in front of him, over the eight-by-eight checkered square that’s burned into his brain. It used to bring him some sense of comfort, used to be a puzzle he could occupy himself with when he needed a distraction. But now it just reminds him of what he’s lost. 

It reminds him of Gary Michales, of Gideon’s last game, of talking with Alex on the day that Maeve died. It reminds him of Shaw, of leaning against the cement walls, feeling the cool touch of metal on his forehead as he leant up against the bars. It reminds him of thinly veiled threats, of desperately trying to distract himself with chess moves while -

_He’s sitting on the bed when they walk into his cell, looming over him in the darkness. He springs to his feet instinctively, rises on his hackles and tries to make himself large because he’s learned the hard way that making himself small doesn’t work. They sneer at him, glancing ominously between their fists and his body. They have dirty socks clenched in their hands and Spencer knows, he **knows** what they’re going to do with them._

_They just wait there for a long few minutes, watching him sweat and shake and tremble. Trying his best to choke down his fear, all the while knowing it won’t convince them. When they come at him he doesn’t even have time to brace himself - their hands are all over his body, tearing off his clothes because they know it’ll humiliate him, hitting and punching in the places they know it’ll hurt._

_He screamed for help the first few times, but he doesn’t have much fight left anymore. When they shove the sock in his mouth he doesn’t even try to spit it out, just stares up at the ceiling as a huge arm presses into his windpipe and imagines he were somewhere else._

_Somewhere else isn’t good either. He’s stripped naked, he’s being held down - he’s twelve years old and lying on the football field, thrashing around and screaming as the bullies hold him down. He remembers getting turf in his mouth, the little rubber pellets grating like sand against his tongue as they dragged him over to the goal post. He remembers crying and crying and crying for help, remembers all the faces laughing and pointing and smirking as he struggled against the ropes._

_Someone slams his head back into the concrete wall of the cell - he snaps his eyes open and sees stars, sees a man a few inches taller than him and at least twice as broad. He’s supposed to be keeping his head down, doing his time until his team can get him out, but how can he? How can he when they keep coming into his cell and beating him down?_

_The man laughs with his buddies, laughs as the lot of them take turns spitting and hitting and snarling insults. Spencer tries his best to shut them out, unfocuses his eyes even as the leader grabs his chin and leers down at him, his breath hot and wet on Spencer’s face. He thinks of chess instead, plays through Gideon’s last game in his mind because somehow thinking of the pain of the past eases the pain of now. He thinks of the books his mother used to read to him, of being cradled in her lap as she brushed her fingers through his hair and sang songs in her off-key voice._

_Fingers thread through his hair and pull too tight, rip the strands from the roots as they grip him by the head and throw him aside. Spencer falls to the floor as they turn to go, walking out the cell without a second glance as his head cracks against the concrete floor._

_He just lies there, doesn’t even move from the uncomfortable position he fell into until he can’t hear their footsteps anymore. And then he reaches up to pull the sock from his mouth, pressing his forehead to the floor and wishing he could cry without the whole block overhearing. He swallows and turns his head after some indiscriminate amount of time, blinking open the eyes he didn’t realize he’d clenched shut. In front of him is the book he slipped from the library the week before._

_**It must’ve fallen** , Spencer thinks, **To Kill a Mockingbird.**_

_He has the whole thing memorized. And so he doesn’t bother to pick himself up, doesn’t bother to redress. He just lies there on the floor of his cell and runs through the book in his mind, recites, “When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow. When it healed, and Jem’s fears of never being able to play football were assuaged, he was seldom self-conscious about his injury…”*_

\- “Can I sit with you?” a voice jolts Spencer out of his thoughts. He flinches, retracting his arms to grasp his middle and looking up with wide eyes.

“Oh, sorry!” the man in front of him chuckles, “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“O-oh, um -” Spencer stutters, tucking his bare hands under his armpits and trying to calm his racing heart, “N-no, it’s okay. You can…y-yeah, you can sit with me. It’s fine.”

“Thanks,” the man just smiles for a moment before sitting down across from Spencer. He places his bag on the ground beside him, takes a moment to rub his hands together for warmth before opening up the bag. He pulls out a set of chess pieces from within, then brushes off the thin layer of snow on the table and starts setting up the board.

“You play?” he inquires, delicately arranging the pieces in perfect rows.

“Huh?” 

The man giggles, looking up at Spencer with a gentle smile. “Chess. Do you play?”

“Um, yeah I…,” Spencer falters for a moment - he hasn’t actually played since getting out of prison. He’s been too afraid. That being said, he certainly wants to be able to play again. “Yeah, I do.”

“Nice,” the man grins, “You want black or white?”

Spencer blinks down at the board, at the pieces in front of him. “Black,” he mutters, “I’ll…I’ll take black.”

The man raises his eyebrows but doesn’t say anything, just keeps setting up the pieces until the board is perfectly arranged - black on Spencer’s side and white on his. “I’m (y/n),” he says, extending a hand in Spencer’s direction.

Spencer’s not sure what to do with it at first, just furrows his brow and mumbles, “What?”

The man laughs, a bright smile overtaking his face. “I’m (y/n), it’s my name. I just thought I ought to introduce myself before we play, you know?”

Spencer nods, slowly reaching out to take the hand in front of him. “I’m Spencer.”

“Oh shit - your hands are cold!” (y/n) exclaims as their hands connect, “Here - I have a beanie and an extra pair of gloves in my bag that might help?”

Suddenly there’s a knitted beanie and two gloves being thrust in his direction. And Spencer’s not usually one to take things from strangers, but the soft fabric feels warm in his hands. Spencer smiles at the man sitting across from him and pulls the beanie over his head. It feels good.

By the time he looks up again, (y/n) is raising an eyebrow in his direction and grinning. “Your go,” he says, and Spencer realizes that he’s already made his first move.

And so they play, the pieces dancing across the board, the game overthrowing any lingering unwanted memories. “Checkmate!” (y/n) exclaims from across the table, sitting back and smiling as Spencer blinks down at the board.

“Wha -” Spencer stutters, “I-I never lose! How…what…?”

(y/n) just chuckles, tilting his head to the side as if to challenge him. It alights a fire in Spencer’s belly that he’d almost forgotten, alights the desire to play the game for fun, for a challenge and not just to pass the time. “Oooh, you’re on,” he smirks, already moving to reset the board.

They play like that for hours, only taking a brief intermission so that Spencer can run across the street and grab his coat. (y/n) wins in the end, besting Spencer by one round, the last one they can play before nightfall. “So _Spencer,_ huh?” (y/n) grins, “You’re good.”

“So are you,” Spencer chuckles, smiling wide even with cheeks stiff from the cold, “I’m impressed. You’re…you’re amazing.”

(y/n) bites his lip and shakes his head, “So…we should do this again sometime. Maybe somewhere where it’s a little less freezing cold.”

“Yeah,” Spencer nods - his cheeks feel strangely hot, but he writes it off as the flush from the cold. “Yeah we should. I’d like that a lot.”

…

(y/n) standing beside him in a museum one Saturday when it finally hits him. 

“Are we…” Spencer trails off for a moment before taking a deep breath to collect himself, “Are we dating?”

(y/n) blinks at him in surprise, his cheeks growing warm as the sudden question. “W-well, I mean -” he stutters, “Yeah, I-I thought we were. But…I guess we don’t have to be if you don’t -”

“No!” Spencer interrupts him, “No, I…I do. I do want to. I just…I haven’t dated anyone in a really long time, and I guess I just didn’t realize.”

“Ah man,” (y/n) smiles, shaking his head as he lets out soft laughter, “That is such a _you_ thing to say.”

“W-what!?” Spencer protests with a laugh, “No, I…I know I can be really oblivious. I guess…I mean part of it is just how I am but also…I’ve never had a romantic relationship that ended well. I guess it’s just easier not to let myself consider it as a possibility.”

(y/n) doesn’t look at him with sorrow or pity or anything like that. He just takes Spencer’s hand in his and threads their fingers together, letting their arms sway back and forth between them. “Well,” he smiles, “I think it’ll go well this time. I have a good feeling about us.”

Spencer’s smile falters at that - he sucks in a nervous breath and swallows, looking down at his shoes and nervously stepping back and forth. “There’s a lot I haven’t told you,” he mumbles, “You might not like me so much after you find out.”

“Spencer,” (y/n) says, serious this time, “Spencer, look at me.”

It takes him a moment and a shaky breath, but he does.

“We all have secrets, dark stuff from the past we don’t want other people to know about. We’ve all done bad things, _all of us_. And I can’t speak for who you were before we met, but when I look at the man in front of me right now? The man holding my hand as we look at,” (y/n) pauses to gesture towards the painting in front of him, filled with bright colors and splatters and geometric shapes, “abstract art. You’re a good man _right now_. I’ve known that you’re a good man from the first time we played chess in the park, and you smiled when I won. I have a good feeling about you, about _us_. And I don’t think anything you did in the past is going to change that.”

“But -”

“Shhh,” (y/n) smiles softly, cupping Spencer’s cheeks in his hands and leaning in until his lips brush up against Spencer’s, “Now are you gonna kiss me or not?”

Spencer does.

________

*from to kill a mocking bird by harper lee


End file.
